Life Itself
by anexistence
Summary: A collection of short stories or drabbles inspired by various prompts, lyrics, real life events and whatevers.
1. make me

It starts with him being a know it all. It always does. Lily is lounging on the couch and playing muggle chess. She enchanted figures and the board to float next to her, and now she is mindlessly poking at the figures with the tip of her wand and dragging them to the desired position. Lily says it's intellectually stimulating for her, James says she just wants to beat him once in her life. The redhead disagrees.

He is sitting in the armchair next to her, yesterday's Daily Prophet in his hands, his eyes unfocused on the words in front of him. James hates muggle chess, he does. Oftentimes he calls it boring and uneventful, mostly because there is no real figure destruction. He also just point blank believes that the figures ought to move on their own. Lily thinks James is an idiot, but that is nor here not there, and certainly not news.

"I can feel you staring," her voice echoes through the empty common room, it's almost two o'clock in the morning and both of them had fallen asleep in the afternoon. The five hour nap was what kept them awake for so long.

James snorts, "Am not."

"Are too." Lily tilts her head slightly backwards, green eyes playfully glaring at him. "Say it and be done with it, James."

For a few seconds he keeps his silence, weighs his options. If he speaks then she will undoubtedly be irritated, and if he were being genuine he had been rather horny all day long. Plus, for some reason, Lily looks really attractive in his old pyjama bottoms and a T-shirt with a pattern of tiny cats. Then he sighs, because he knows he can't keep this in, and opens his mouth.

"I just think your chess is boring, that's all."

"We've been over that." She retorts, returning her attention to the game in question and moving the only white knight on the board.

"And that's an idiotic move. Can't you tell that it won't pay off in about… three moves?" James interrupts.

"Excuse me?"

"You always do that," he starts, but quickly stops as the playful glint vanishes from Lily's green eyes and she is now merely glaring.

"Did you call me an idiot? I am the only person who managed to beat you in this game!" Her voice raises slightly, it always does when she is truly upset.

In his armchair, James shifts uncomfortably.

"What?" His girlfriend demands. "James?"

"Nothing, Lily. It's fine, the move is alright, I was wrong." Then he tries to lift the day old newspaper to hid his face.

"Bollocks. You are lying, you-OH MY GOD!" Her voice is now simply high, and James peers at her over the top of the newspaper. "YOU HAVE BEEN LETTING ME WIN!"

"Well, I wouldn't say that…" He starts.

"I can't believe this, you massive liar." She is upset, James can tell. But for some reason she is also smiling.

The dark haired boy lowers the newspaper until the top is just beneath his chin, "You look really cute when you win. You do the whole happy dance. So, if I have to power through your horribly obvious chess moves, then… I do?"

Lily stares at him, eyebrows furrowed and lips pursed, "Oh, shut up, you massive twat."

She says it endearingly, and James is far too relieved that she let this go, so he smiles in response, "How 'bout you make me?"


	2. kiss me

Lily Evans was hiding behind a curtain. It was a peculiar position she had found herself in, but it was necessary. It was necessary because somehow, more than likely thanks to karma and her complete lack of luck during the past few months, her ex-boyfriend had been invited to the Slug Club Christmas party. To top it off this year's party turned out to gather twice as many people, and to her complete devastation she just couldn't escape the sight of Anthony Clearwater and Marie Johnson. This was quite unfortunate because:

 _1) Anthony was a horrible, deceitful asshat,_

 _2) Marie seemed like such a sweet girl but what were the chances that she had no idea Anthony was dating Lily when they started hooking up,_

 _3) No girl wants her ex-asshat-boyfriend to see her without a date, especially not if his date is the girl he cheated with (whom he is also dating)._

It was frankly a disaster on many levels. It had been so disastrous that Lily hadn't even managed to reach the refreshments table, which was a shame because if anything Slughorn's parties were famous for the extraordinary food he served.

"Lily?" The voice coming from the balcony startled the redhead so much that she jumped while a tiny squeak escaped her lips. Turning around she was faced with James Potter casually nibbling on a cannolo, while three other cannoli resided in the plate in his right hand. "What exactly are you doing?" He asked, eyebrow raised, while extending the plate towards her.

Lily felt her stomach grumble and, with a sigh, accepted his offer. "I'm hiding." She spoke after gulping down two cannoli in a matter of seconds.

"Avoiding ol' Slug, eh?" James smirked, finishing off the last cannolo. "I can relate. This is actually the first year I'm here on my own, apparently Sirius somehow upset him. And the other two don't get invited."

Lily nodded, she was barely listening to him, her eyes trained on the crowd near the balcony in case a certain couple were to appear. "Oh, yeah… no. You could have brought a date."

Running a hand through his hair, James shrugged his shoulders. "I don't think many fit birds are actually into this, to be honest. Plus, this was sort of a last minute decision."

The redhead nodded once again.

"Oh, come on. You'll hear Slug from a mile away. We are safe here." Her current companion chuckled, running his hand through his hair once again. Lily wished he would stop.

"I'm not hiding from Slughorn, James." She spoke quietly, her body half behind the curtain, her green eyes trained on the refreshments table. Lily's stomach was grumbling, even more so after the cannoli she ate. Food was necessary. "I'm hungry."

Ignoring the ambiguous answer James grabbed her wrist and all but dragged her towards the food that she had been eyeing. Lily protested, of course, unwilling to leave the shadows of the curtain and be exposed to potential cheating gaze of a person she'd rather not name.

"Merlin, ginger. Why are you so… so stiff tonight?" James asked over his shoulder a moment before handing her an empty plate and promptly piling copious amounts of food onto it. As much as it could fit.

"It's my ex-boyfriend, alright?" She snapped. "He's here. With…"

Lily saw James' eyebrows furrow, then raise in understanding. "Marie. Oh, well… that's quite unfortunate for you, really. I understand the hiding now. Just ignore them, though." He finished, piling a Cauldron Cake on top of the food in the plate.

"Well, that sorts out everything." Lily's voice dripped with sarcasm. "Why didn't I think of that? What a genius you are James Potter?" And with a swift turn on her heel she was walking away from him. After a split second of staring after her quickly disappearing form James came to his senses and, while balancing the food on the plate carefully, quickly followed after her.

"Oh, come on Lily." James shoved a Vanilla Puff in his mouth.

"Don't be so loud." Lily spoke over her shoulder, meandering in between a couple of extremely tall witches before stepping out onto a small balcony. A second later the boy with the messy dark hair stepped out to join her, immediately handing her the plate filled with food.

Lily frowned at him briskly before diving in and devouring smoked salmon sandwich in just a few bites.

"Anyway, Evans. What I wanted to say was… don't let that tosser ruin your night. It's really not worth it. Passing up all that food is not worth it." He grinned. "Not to mention the mead. Oh, the mead."

The red haired girl chewed angrily, before gulping down a fairly sized bite. "James Potter you are not seventeen yet, how do you get mead here?" She gave him some time to answer, but her only reply was a smirk on the dumb boy's face.

"Seriously, Lily? You are asking me how I do something that I am not allowed to do? Are we being serious right now at this moment?"

Lily stared at him, a tiny frown forming just between her eyebrows. It travelled from the top of her nose, as she squinted her eyes, all the way down to her lips until they were pursed in contemplation. Nodding her head ever so lightly she grabbed the last piece of chocolate fudge that was on the plate and quickly finished it in only a few bites. Spurred on by some wild sentiment (which might have been rage, might have been spite, might have been a mixture of both with sadness) she threw the plate over the balcony while a shocked James Potter watched on.

"Alright, James. Let's go."

"Go where?"

She looked over at the mead table. "To get the mead, obviously."

James raised his eyebrows. "What?"

"Are you just going to stare at me like that or are we going to get drunk?"

The boy opened and shut his mouth a few times, as if contemplating what exactly was the right thing to say. After recollecting himself though, the signature smirk found his way back to his lips and the classic glint of mischief was behind the specs. "You sure you can handle it, Evans."

With a roll of her eyes she tugged on his arm, dragging him lightly behind her. "As sure as I'll ever be. Come now, I am your Sirius for the night."

James followed behind. "You do know things between Sirius and me get quite heated, right?"

Looking forward, Lily supressed a smile. "Well, then I'll just be Remus."

They stepped away from the more crowded part of the room and James could now walk right beside her. "Oh, don't even get me started on the two of us. Sirius is ice cold compared to good ol' Lupin."

"Oh, for the love of Merlin Potter!" Lily exclaimed, before laughing out loud for the first time that evening. "You are a disaster."

He rolled his eyes before rushing ahead and approaching a house elf that was handing out mead. "Hello, Rinxy."

"Oh, Master Potter!" The tiny house elf exclaimed. "We haven't seen you in weeks!"

"Been busy." He smiled. "Listen, I know we're not seventeen here, but I was wondering…" The boy trailed off as Rinxy sped off behind the mead display.

"Wow, your prowess at getting mead is outstanding." Lily joked. "Consider me impressed."

James sighed, lifting up his right hand as if to shush her, leaned towards her, and started counting down from five in a low whisper. The red head could feel his breath hit her exposed neck ever so slightly as he reached the end of his countdown. As if on cue Rinxy came back with four smaller crystal bottles of mead and two glasses. James pocketed the lot and thanked the house elf before walking towards the nearest balcony with Lily following in tow.

"I can't believe you, you delinquent." She chuckled. "I swear, the lot of you are like Hogwarts mafia, you have connections everywhere."

James shrugged. "Eh, we manage." He placed the two glasses on the edge of the stone wall and filled each with mead. "Cheers, Evans."

Lily was drunk. Lily was drunk and leaning over the edge of that balcony with James Potter's right hand around her waist as his left one held onto the wall behind him.

"You'll fall down, you idiot."

She giggled. "Well, you'll fall with me, which makes you an idiot too."

He chuckled. "Nah, I reckon I'll let you fall."

He heard her gasp before she ceased her reckless behaviour and turned to face him. Her breath hit his face as soon as she spoke and he could smell the alcohol on it. After all they had both finished quite an amount of mead in record time. "You are an awful friend, James Potter, you are."

"Well, I must have some priorities." James laughed. "If I were to fall with you, who would then hold a speech at your wake?"

"Well you certainly wouldn't be holding the speech either way!" She protested, now stumbling away from him and collapsing on the floor in the corner. "What'd you ev'n write?"

Sighing James looked down at the drunk girl in front of him. He ran his hand through his hair licking his lips before shrugging nonchalantly and sitting down next to her.

"I would write," he started dramatically, "Lil' Evans, the maddest bird ever, died because she couldn't handle the mead."

Lily giggled. "That's mean. That is a mean thing to say, James." He was going out of focus every now and again, and she tried to do her best to keep her eyes on him. His face had a lot of tiny freckles.

"Is it not true though?" His breath smelled like alcohol, mead and roses. Roses because the last bottle of mead had been infused with rose syrup potion which filled the drinker's head with fantastic fuzziness for a short period of time.

"'s not." Lily hiccupped. "I handle it, jus' fine."

He comfortingly patted her knee, "Sure you do, Evans, sure you do."

"Don't patrolize me!"

James bit his lip to stop a smile. "Don't what?"

"Patro. Nice. Me." Lily smiled. "Patronize. Oh, Merlin. I may have had a bit too much." She leaned her head against the wall facing him.

The silence around them seemed to lie heavy, but comfortingly. Behind his glasses, Lily could see James calculating, she could see his eyes wondering all over his face. She could see how there was a crease just to the right of his lips where a permanent smirk was always etched in ever so softly. She saw when he lifted his hand to remove a strand of her hair that had fallen out. He tucked it gently behind her ear, his face getting just an inch closer.

Then the silence was interrupted as a couple burst outside, the girl giggling loudly as the boy tried to wrap his arms around her from behind. Lily's heart sank as he spoke, she knew that voice too well. James could see her tense up, but she didn't move. Instead she leaned closer to him, a frown on her face.

"Kiss me… please."

James' eyes darted towards Anthony Clearwater and Marie Johnson, his thoughts clearing up. And he kissed her. He was kissing a sad, completely drunk Lily Evans at the top of a tower as her ex cheating boyfriend tried to snog his new girlfriend, and James felt positively bad about it. Or at least he had felt bad about it until the cheating ex boyfriend had noticed the two kissing on the floor.

And Anthony had made a comment about moving on quickly. And Marie shushed him and dragged the cheating tosser away.

And Lily Evans shifted, her hands grabbing onto the collar of James' button up as she ungracefully moved to sit in his lap, all the while kissing him. Her head would have exploded had she been drunk, but now all she could feel was the warm fuzziness and James' lips.

And James was positively confused.

And Lily really couldn't handle the mead.

And James woke up with a hickey that he had to explain to the Marauders.

* * *

 _Thank you for reading and please comment if you have any prompts or idek just give me a sentence or something and I will try to write a short story or a drabble based on it and publish it as soon as possible._

 _Maja_


	3. marry me

James was sick. Not the random coughing, runny nose sick, but rather truly sick.

He had a fever, a really high fever. He announced it to Lily who barged into the boys' dormitory five minutes after he'd let her know that he was 'feeling a bit under the weather' and thus couldn't meet her for dinner. And he had announced it in a very James Potter manner.

"Lily, how wonderful." He was lying in bed covered with every blanket he could find in the dormitory. "You won't believe it, my temperature finally matches my amazing looks!" He coughed.

The red haired girl stared at him dumbfounded.

"I'm hot Lily, so hot!" James chuckled, before squeezing his eyes shut. "Ugh, my head."

"What on Earth?" His girlfriend was leaning over his bed after a couple of quick strides. Her hand soon found his forehead, which was indeed hot. "James! You are burning up!"

The boy smiled sheepishly. "I know, that's what I'm telling you."

"Idiot."

"Hey, you can't insult a sick person."

She started going through his drawers. "Well, you my darling are an exception… Don't you have a potion for this fever?"

"Nah," he offered her a weak smile, "we may have, sort of drank it all last weekend."

Her pretty full lips were now pursed as she stared down at him a scowl on her face. "I am not wrong in assuming that neither one of you was sick last weekend, am I?"

James shrugged his shoulders, although the shrug was barely visible beneath all the blankets lying on top of him. "It causes really beautiful hallucinations when you're not sick."

"Merlin."

"Really, really pretty, I promise."

Lily pinched the bridge of her nose. "Horrible. You are incorrigible, James Potter." But she was smiling, even if she tried her best to control it.

"I'll be fine."

"I'll go get you some tea and see if I have anything for the fever."

* * *

When she returns with a vial of bright yellow potion he feels his hear skip a beat, and for the first time it is not solely due to his girlfriend's beauty. As he swallows the potion in a split second, and his eyes get a bit dopey he lays back against a pile of pillows and whispers a soft, "Marry me?"

The red haired girl sighs softly. Without making much noise she leaves a cup of hot tea on the nightstand and fixes the blankets before departing towards the Great Hall.

* * *

 _A/N: Hope you like it, comments are chocolate._

 _Love,_  
 _Maja_


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